It has become increasingly popular to employ towelettes or “wipes” in various industries and in everyday life. Typically, a towelette or wipe is a fibrous piece of material that is impregnated or saturated with a cleanser or treatment, such as disinfectant, detergent, solvent, wax or polish, by way of example only. While such towelettes have previously been maintained in containers in a fan fold arrangement, where the towelettes are separate and independent of each other, the most common and utilitarian type presently employed finds the towelettes forming a continuous web and being separable from each other by means of perforations or the like. Typically, the towelettes are maintained upon a continuous roll, although the invention contemplates random mass storage and maintenance of the same. In such arrangements, the tub or container maintaining the towelettes has generally been provided with a lid having a rip fence or other separating mechanism to allow for the separation of the leading towelette from the remaining towelettes on the roll or within the grouping.
Several problems have characterized the prior art devices. Most formidable is the mechanism by which the leading edge of the first towelette is threaded into the rip fence, such that the remainder of the web may be progressively pulled therethrough and the towelettes individually separated. Prior devices have typically required removal of the lid from the tub or container of towelettes, the threading of the leading towelette through the rip fence, and the replacement of the lid upon the tub. Such a process has typically been found to be complex and given to error and frustration by the user. Moreover, the prior art towelette dispensers have not been given to a simplicity in design that provides a mechanism that ensures that the leading edge of the next towelette to be dispensed is stuffed within the container or tub and not in the way of the lid or cap when it is to be closed and sealed. The prior art dispensers have also had dispensing lids that are complex and costly, often being of multiple pieces requiring seam welding and the like to configure the pieces into an operative unit. This can be improved upon to the advantage of the art.
Additionally, the common dispensing lids often fit over seals or barrier caps that prevent the evaporation of any solution within the towelettes and the tub during transportation and initial storage before the first use. The lids must be removed to access the barrier cap for removal. Thus the connection between the lid and the tub must be aggressive enough to hold the lid on the tub, but weak enough so as to allow the removal of the lid from the tub. This can result in making the lid connect to the tub is such a way that the cleanser or other treatment can evaporate and exit the tub through the connection between the lid and tub, decreasing the practical storage length for the tub of towelettes. Also, having to remove the lid to remove the barrier cap is an additional step required to begin using the towelettes, and requires that the tub be opened and the towelettes exposed to evaporation for the time during which the lid and barrier cap are removed and before the lid is again applied and closed.
There remains a need in the art for a simple, cost effective, and reliable lid for a towelette dispenser that allows for ease of use and ease of set-up. There also remains a need for better sealing methods for towelette dispensers for transportation and initial storage before the first use.